I feel sorry for Ironclad, Stardock helped with the game but really, they just Published it, IRONCLAD made SOASE!

no, they wouldn't, but here they had the advantage that SD had experience in the genre they were working on. at least remotely. don't know how much help they could provide for a fps.

apart from that: can there be so many improvements to mp shooters? other than graphic updates? I haven't played UT 3, but from what I heard and read, little was changes, weapons mostly stayed, modes mostly stayed. the last great innovation was the inclusion of vehicles in the last one (which imo was very well done). I could go on for a bit, but I think I made my point. if, of course, the two companies could create some kind of discussion and debate on how the game could be on a conceptual level. I guess SD as a publisher would be more willing to accept unorthodox, new ideas, which can make the game a great success.

There's a massive level of innovation left to do in the fps genre.  The lack of it is one of the problems it suffers.

When they stop getting caught up in graphics and start working on making them interesting, I'll be depressed by my inability to play them online.  We need command structure, fortification capability, real strategic and tactical values in loadout decisions, more creative weaponry.  Honestly, how many games actually have an awesomely unique weapon in the last decade?  Why is it that I find the guns in Doom and Duke Nukem3d to be of more interest than the ones in the latest and greatest?

The technology is there, we just need the balls to go for the crazy shit.  The best innovation right now is being done in mods instead of the retail products, it's pathetic.  I want first person strategy games like natural selection, I want the reverse too.  Strategy games with your own command unit that you control in first person.  Forget the pansy top down shit they did in the TA games, put me in the driver's seat of a doomsday machine and let me slug it out with my opponent while we throw armies at each other.  I want rpg style character creation and fantasy weapons and magic, complete with nice little capabilities like a necromancer being able to raise an army from his victims.  Imagine the bloodbaths you could have in a round based game where you joined a faction with a diverse array of capabilities and improvements at your disposal, commanding ai controlled thralls, blasting entire armies with direct damage, status effects, becoming invisible and sneaking past enemy lines to assassinate the goons leading their own armies.

The genre has barely scratched the surface of what it's capable of, even the rpg's don't take themselves seriously and go the distance.

The ideal improvements for the sequel to a successful online multiplayer FPS game would be to keep the winning formula (keep the feel of the game play and the weapons and game types the same) while improving the graphics, the netcoding, the cheat protection, the server administration, the server browser, and the user interface while perhaps offering up high quality new maps and new game types.

From the perspective of a devoted fan of an older FPS game, one of the crucial key improvements is that the game gets put back on store shelves, it gets marketed, people buy it, and throngs of people who are new to the franchise come online, increasing online player counts and bringing new people into the community.  After all, a fan of the original who plays the game to this day is happy to keep playing the older game but craves having a larger community of people to play it with.  For example, I'd love to play UT99 DOMination but the game no longer has a sufficient player base to support that game type at all.  (This is similar to Sins's problem; Sins doesn't have a large enough online multiplayer community to have clans or to have enough people who take the game seriously enough that they'd be willing to download, install, and play custom maps and mods online).  I'd also like to play regular weapons Capture-the-Flag on populated public servers that host an assortment of custom maps but most of the servers are now either Instagib or all-Sniper Rifles.  (I do play a lot of UT99 regular weapons CTF, but it's in the form of clan-match style 5-on-5 organized pickup games matches, which are a tremendous amount of fun--if there are any UT99 CTF players reading this, just ask and I can hook you up.)

UT3 failed miserably on all of these counts except maybe for netcoding and graphics.

Ideally, a UT4 would be a bona-fide UT99-2 but with modern graphics, the best of the newer game types (Onslaught, Invasion, Bombing Run, Vehicle CTF) in addition to the original game types (Deathmatch, Team DM, CTF, Domination, and Assault) and a superb user interface and server browser.